My point: With our human power and abilities to do the almost supernatural, it gets hard to see that there is a God outside of our own implicit claimto be; a creator and sustainer of all living things.

As we live in a world that is so enlightened with human knowledge — human light — we should be aware that too much light can also make one blind.

So, the voice of the prophet inside of me wants to say that perhaps, in the midst of life, we are in death; and in the midst of great light, we find ourselves walking in darkness.

We live in communities full of people, yet plagued by loneliness. Collectively, we have more money than ever before, but are bankrupt inwardly. We have toys innumerable, yet find that authentic joy is a stranger. We have larger places of worship, but a fading faith in anything outside of self.

It seems the more we have the less we are, and the more enlightened we are the darker our lives ... except for those of us who use the scriptures as our lamp and guide.

We who find ourselves stumbling through dark times are reminded in the biblical story that God, the one who is the true light of knowledge and salvation, dwells in dark places.

The Jewish leader Nicodemus finds the Lord in the dark. And from the Hebrew scriptures the psalmist declares that the light of God’s salvation shines in the night, when he writes in Psalms 139:11-12, “If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.”